Skip to main content

Acronis 2010 won't restore to C drive

Thread needs solution

I have booted from my Acronis bootable CD and tried to restore my C drive to an earlier image.
Acronis won't let me restore to the C drive -- it's "visible" in the destination list, but greyed-out. It will only let me "restore" to a different drive... which doesn't do me any good, because it's the C drive that I need to restore.

Something's wrong here... I thought the purpose of making an image of the C drive was to be able to restore it when necessary??

0 Users found this helpful

Do NOT use drive letters for identification purposes. Windows assigns drive letters using their method but the the recovery program is Linux and uises a different method.

First, take the time to assign some meaningful volume names to each of your partitions. You can do this from within Windows Disk Management; or you can Right click on each drive letter and choose "Properties" and names can be assigned there.

The name can be up to 11 charactes but no spaces or periods. I personally like to the Windows drive letter as part of the name.

For example on your Windows Drive C. The name assigned by you might be
XP_Pro-C
Vista-C
Win7-C
If you have a letter D partition, the name assigned by you might be
Data-D
Files-D
Recovery-D

Once you get that done for all your drive letters (CDRom excluded)
then you can again boot from the CD and match your source and backup based on your new names ignoring the letters assigned by TrueImage. Additionally, you can use identifiers such as partition sizes, used space, etc for identification.

Your backup source file will not have the name changes but the target will have the new names. So it is just a question of matching the source partition with the same partition in the target and ignoring drive letters. Of course, if you are not sure of your selection, then cancel and get your identification about your partitions.

Once you have performed your restore, your Drive C will have to be renamed again as your restore wiped away your recent name assignment of that partition. Future backups will include the new names as a normal part of the backup so the identification can be easier.

This is a link showing an example of what some drive names used on my drives.
http://forum.acronis.com/sites/default/files/forum/2010/09/14329/2010-s…

Should you need more assistance with drive naming, it might help for you to post a picture of what your Windows Disk Mangement looks like.

I followed the instruction given above to renamed my C: drive to System-C.
Yet, the ATI 2010 Boot CD still stated my C: drive as unlabeled partition.
I was unable to restore the backup.tib to my C: drive.

How I suppose to restore the backup.tib to my original C: drive?

When choosing what to restore, you are looking at the contents of the backup. If you created the backup prior to assigning "System-C" to your disk, then the backup will not include the "system-c" name.

One reason for it being greyed out is that you could be trying to choose the wrong restore location. Do not use the drive letter as your sole choice. Before you start, look at characteristics of your "system-c" partition. What is its size and how much used space. Use this informtion in determining your restore location.

While you will get the best results by performing the restore when booted from the Rescue CD, you can practice or simulate the same procedures from within Windows so you better understand the various screens. If you have questions about a particular screen, Windows will allow you to do a screen capture which you can upload as an attachment to your postings.

When you get to the restore screen labeled "Restore Wizard/Select items to restore", observe the capacity and used space of the partition to be restored. Also note whether that partition is marked as Active or Primary or both.

Also, when you get to the restore screen labeled" "Specify restore settings for Partition C", you must click on the "new location" option in upper right of Window. Note the capacity and used space of what is offered. Is there anything there that comes close to matching the same size in the "Select items to Restore" screen? Ignore drive letters as they may differ in the CD

from how used inside Windows.

Boot from the Rescue CD and check what options are offered. Again, it can be is practice until you get to the summary screen where you are presented with the choice of Proceed or Cancel. Click Cancel to stop. If you click the Proceed button, you are committed to the restore. The summary screen should show the sizes being replaced which helps to determine whether you have made the correct partition replacement choice.

Image 1 Click image to enlarge viewing.

Image 2

Image 3